Look down as you walk the streets of Gent and you may see the glint of their eyes … finding your heart from below.
The basements hold mysteries. They radiate darkness … or is that radiance? Maybe it’s only a root cellar, with piles of potatoes yearning for the light. Or even a crawl space. I wonder who is crawling ever forward … towards you?
Secrets of the dark want to say hello, perhaps even sucking you down through the grating for their purposes.
Will the unaware be taken into the underworld and become the subjects of … experiments? And will they survive?
Perhaps you will be accompanied as you descend. Will all the dead who ever died be eager to wrap their bony fingers around your neck?
I’ve given much to a lot of people in my life. Sometimes it’s money but usually it’s my attention. I hope the other person has felt that in conversation I have only been with them. In those moments the outside world doesn’t exist.
I like to think that one of my gifts to folks is offering them my time:
Let us linger here together
Feeling the words that want to be spoken
Feeling thewarmth that wants to be shared
Finding what’s true
There’s no “hurry up”, no “on to the next”
It’s you and me
***
Here’s some lovely giving by Dan Clark’s dad. May he inspire all of us to be generous.
Once when I was a teenager, my father and I were standing in line to buy tickets for the circus.
Finally, there was only one family between us and the ticket counter. This family made a big impression on me. There were eight children, all probably under the age of twelve. You could tell they didn’t have a lot of money. Their clothes were not expensive, but they were clean. The children were well-behaved, all of them standing in line. One could sense they had never been to the circus before. It promised to be a highlight of their young lives.
The ticket lady asked the father how many tickets he wanted. He proudly responded, “Please let me buy eight children’s tickets and two adult tickets so I can take my family to the circus.”
The ticket lady quoted the price.
The father leaned a little closer and asked, “How much did you say?”
The ticket lady again quoted the price. The man didn’t have enough money.
How was he supposed to turn and tell his eight kids that he didn’t have enough money to take them to the circus?
Seeing what was going on, my dad put his hand into his pocket, pulled out a $20 bill and dropped it on the ground. My father reached down, picked up the bill, tapped the man on the shoulder and said, “Excuse me, sir, this fell out of your pocket.”
The man knew what was going on. He wasn’t begging for a handout but certainly appreciated the help in a desperate, heartbreaking, embarrassing situation.
He looked straight into my dad’s eyes, took my dad’s hand in both of his, squeezed tightly onto the $20 bill, and with his lip quivering, he replied, “Thank you, thank you, sir. This really means a lot to me and my family.”
My father and I went back to our car and drove home. We didn’t go to the circus that night, but we didn’t go without.
Life is sure rock and roll, “I never promised you a rose garden” and all that.
I had three events last night and I wanted to be present and happy for them all. The first two were with the Evolutionary Collective on Zoom. A meeting and then assisting at the basic EC course. I made a difference in both.
Dessert was going to be a group of us reading the play Pygmalion at Gregor Samsa. I was so looking forward to being with my friends: Rani, Lola, Harry and Witold. And of course becoming a character or two.
Because of the course, I arrived an-hour-and-a-half late. A sweet oval of playreaders was in the centre of the room. I sat against a wall, eyes closed, feeling the weight of the last three hours and enjoying the music of the spoken word.
I could feel sleep nudging me but it was not yet time. We were together. I wasn’t going to miss this.
At the break between acts, Harry asked me to play Henry Higgins in the next one. He’s the pronunciation and grammatical expert who vows to transform the speech of Eliza Doolittle – a flower girl – into that of a duchess.
As I read, I struggled with fatigue, reading the small font, and twisting to see the book which my neighbour and I held. “Too bad, Bruce. Suck it up.”
I had my moments when I was Henry. Gosh, I love these readings. Hearing my voice turned in a strange way, in awe of others’ voices as they animated their characters.
After the act concluded, a fellow actor said he liked my voice but my Henry Higgins wasn’t “bad” enough. I wasn’t strong enough in that moment to let his comment float away. I was triggered. My mind knew the value of straight feedback but my heart was bleeding.
It took me awhile to get that he was right, that his comments were a gift, not an assault. I smiled inside my head that I had lost mere minutes in the mire, not days.
At another break between acts, someone asked Lola about her ideal man (or something like that). She replied with some version of “I don’t know.”
I mentioned to the group that the next love of my life is named Elise, and I haven’t met her yet. “She lives in Gent and she loves music and dancing.”
We went back to the reading. This time I was Mr. Doolittle, Eliza’s father.
I gave what I had for my character and I loved the long back-and-forth between Eliza and Henry. But no one knew what was happening inside the Mr. Kerr pretending to be the Mr. Doolittle.
Even though I had jovially described my familiar Elise story, now I was flooded with despair. My loneliness ground down deep into my bones. I was lost.
And I stayed in the woe, despite trying to pull myself up. The curtain closed on Pygmalion, a few words were passed between tired humans after midnight, hugs were shared, and off we went into the night, seeking the comfort of our beds.
***
I awoke with a word on my lips … WRITE. And so I am. The sorrow has lifted and I’m glad I wrote about it. I tell folks that I write to reach people, not for me. This morning it’s for both.
As the sun said goodnight, I said hello to my meditation chair. It’s so comfy. It’s where I sink into home.
My candle was nearing the end of its life … and I thought about the end of mine. May it be many years away.
The tiny flame disappeared and then reappeared, again and again. The glow roamed the window frame.
Slowly, slowly … less.
I wanted to feel the moment of extinguishing. So I sat with soft eyes and waited.
Maybe ten minutes after the photo, all was black. I missed the jolt of nothingness. I sighed. And I thought of my wife Jody.
Nine years ago, my dear one lay in a hospital bed as night fell, on the edge of death. Jody could no longer speak. As I held her hand, our eyes met long and long.
And then to sleep, me in a cot near my wife. I sensed that Jody’s moment of death was near but I couldn’t keep my eyes open. In the wee hours, I awoke to no sound … no breathing … the end.
***
What comes now is the hymn Abide With Me:
Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day Earth’s joys grow dim, its glories pass away Change and decay in all around I see O Thou who changest not, abide with me
A friend texted me a few days ago, after reading that I was sick:
“When you feel better again, I would love to meet again! It’s been a long time!”
Indeed it has. I smile when I think of our conversations. They’re real, one of my favourite words. “Here’s my life … show me yours.”
Talking with her is easy. I don’t have to censor my words. I don’t have to worry about whether she’ll like my thoughts – or me. There is simply expression, from her and from me, knowing that the other will “get it”, adding no comparison or evaluation. I get to breathe easy.
My friend may be reading this. I’m sure she’ll recognize herself … and me.
I’m thinking of the writers I enjoy. I feel the same ease when I read their novels or poems. “Come. Let’s go for a coffee.” I’m talking about you, Stephen King. Your books are so much more than horror. You create characters that I fall in love with.
And now another name …
Mary Oliver
She was (and is) an American poet who loved what nature taught her. Mary died in 2019 but not really.
Would you like to hear one of her poems? Why not?
Wild Geese
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
With my friend, I can talk about “the soft animal of my body loving what it loves”. We will share the beauty of the rain and “announce our place in the family of things”.
For the past few months I’ve been choosing songs that I want to sing. I’m up to 68 of them. I’ve made a little progress in the learning … and that’s okay. Just having the titles on a list, nestled close to me, means a lot. I don’t know how many I’ll end up learning, to whom I’ll sing them, or where, but I’m happy within the melodies and lyrics.
I’ve searched my memories for favourite songs. One has haunted me. A trio of Canadian singers created a marvel of love, one that touched me ten or twenty years ago. I couldn’t remember the name of the group, the name of the song, or any of the lyrics – except for “red hair” turning to “silver”. Makes it hard to track down on YouTube Music!
At one point the names of the group and the song returned: Tranby Croft and Old French Lane. But the lyrics were still lost to me.
Eventually, after surfing the far corners of the internet for my beloved, I let the song go. The sighings of life unrequited continued.
***
Ever since I arrived in Belgium, I’ve been struggling to get an HD screen resolution on my TV in the evenings. So many phone calls and technician visits. So many people not knowing the solution to my problem.
Last week’s technician suggested that I find an internet video on my laptop, download it onto a USB stick, and insert the stick into a slot on the TV. He said that I should watch the video during the day (when the screen resolution is excellent) and then in the evening (when it’s not). If there’s a difference in the sharpness, the problem is the TV, not the internet.
I knew I had an old USB stick somewhere, and I finally found it in a plastic bag with other electronics stuff. Then I did as asked.
When I opened the flash drive on my TV, I saw that there was a folder named “My Music”. I opened it. “What to my wondering eyes should appear” but a long list of audio files, alphabetically by artist.
My heart jumped. Could it be … ? I had inconveniently forgotten the name of the group but I knew I’d recognize it if the band showed up onscreen.
Scrolling, scrolling … So many names. And the alphabet told me I was nearing the end.
One more turn of the thumb wheel and there it was: “Tranby Croft”. My heart was now well and truly residing in my mouth.
I clicked. It said “Old French Lane”!
The audio began. My mouth opened and my eyes moistened. Home had returned.
Seven jewels lie in the channel South of England's shores Where you and I once walked together Where I walk no more
Hand-in-hand we would go In the sun and in the rain Through the streets of St. Helier Down the Old French Lane
With Jersey sunshine Falling on your hair Shines in strands of red and gold And eyes of green Like the emerald sheens Ofyour ancestral home
That was so long ago Red and gold turn silver now But eyes of green Will never change In my memory somehow
Here is part of the night sky, seen through a super duper telescope. I don’t know what this is. Actually, I don’t know what a lot of life is. Such as a human face …
Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson is an astrophysicist. (I wonder what that really means.) He was being interviewed. It would be easy to assume that he could rightfully say some version of “I know things.” Or maybe not:
I’m baffled all the time. We don’t know what’s driving 96% of the universe. Everybody you know and love and heard of and think about and see in the night sky through a telescope: four percent of the universe.
Huh? Me, with my “reasonable” amount of intelligence, with I believe frequent out-of-the-box thinking, still have no access to most of what is?
(Eyes wide open)
In 1884 English schoolmaster Edwin Abbott Abbott wrote his novel Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions. Everybody lived in length and width, but not in height. Two dimensions, with the third not even conceivable.
Is it so with us?
Despite our richly textured lives, are there vast tracks of space over our horizon?
Those of you who have been reading my words for months may remember that I have a fetish:
Seagulls
When I moved to Gent in January of this year, I fell in love with those who soar. I’d sit on my back terrace with the flow of wings. Moments of heaven.
As spring turned into summer, almost all of my friends left. Were they exploring the skies over Oostende, on the English Channel coast? Probably. Lots to eat on the ocean.
I was sad. Would my second-most-favourite things about Gent ever return? I didn’t have the local knowledge to say.
I became enamoured of pigeons, mourning doves, swallows and tiny darting things of the sky. Most days only one or two gulls met my eyes.
I’ve been so cold lately (or so hot!) My terrace is only a door away but I don’t want to go out there. “I should want to” is a useless thought. I simply need to hunker down and get better.
Late yesterday afternoon, as the sun was preparing to say au revoir, I needed to meditate. I sat in my bedroom chair … and shivered. Soon I was adorned with one hat, one sweater, two coats and mitts! My mind was far from the sweetness of meditation.
Here is what I saw:
I love the high transom windows. Across them, minute by minute, came a cavalcade of gulls. I welcomed them to my home. I thanked them for their beauty: the swooping flight, the tilt of the wings, the sunshine on the belly.
They knew I didn’t have the oomph to sit outside so they made sure my window view included them. Thank you, dear gullies, for saying “Hi.”
I have an experience. And then I try to make sense of the experience … with question after question. What if I just stopped at the experience and lingered there?
Here is an object. I see beauty. That is enough.
My heart wants to stay, to be with this building. Not to analyze, compare or pigeon-hole. Simply to let it wash over me … wave after wave. To welcome the emerald as it enters me. To share it with you.
The questions are crumbling away. They matter not. The need for more words floats into the sky. All that’s left is wonder.
In the wee hours of last night, I had an interview with the owner of a flower shop. Guess that’s a big interest of mine!
I walked into the store, dreaming of colours, of arranging them artfully. Dreaming of being kind to every single customer. Sharing the joy of a young man who wants to wow his girl.
Her eyes bore into me. “Sit down” was an order.
I remember fragments. She snarled. She spat. She made me wrong, over and over.
It was time for me to demo my flower arranging skills … but I’d never done it.
“Not that table! What’s wrong with you? Over there!”
What the fudge is wrong with this woman? I thought. And then …
“Who do you think you are, yelling at me like this? I’m not your servant! Why would I want to work here, in this stinking, toxic pool? I’m got far better places to be.”
“I will not let you infect me with your poison. Find someone else to humiliate.”
“Do you treat your husband this way? Your kids? Is your voice at home venomous like this? Does the word ‘conversation’ mean anything to you?”
“Goodbye.” (And the door slams)
***
O my God! Who was that? > It was you, dear Bruce. Who else could it possibly be?
This wasn’t two weeks ago, when I played George, the man who spat fury at his wife Martha in the reading of the play Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? This wasn’t a role. This was me. Some part of me.
So … I ain’t takin’ no shit! I stand up for myself. I refuse to be drawn into the mire.
Bruce's Blog 